Dietary choices of recovering alcoholics

Nutritional therapy can play an important role in the rehabilitation of an alcoholic. To teach these patients proper eating habits, we need to know what they eat and whether their dietary choices are nutritionally adequate compared to the recommended daily allowances (RDA). We investigated dietary choices of 70 recovering (abstinent) alcoholics who lived in a halfway house but who ate and worked elsewhere everyday. Diets were analyzed for calories, protein, B vitamins, vitamins A and C, calcium, phosphorous, magnesium, iron and zinc. We found that these recovering alcoholics ate adequate amounts of all nutrients except for vitamin B6, magnesium, iron and zinc. With the exception of vitamin B6, the other three nutrients are also found to be low in the diets of the average population. We cannot say at present whether recovering alcoholics need more than the RDA for recovery, but we conclude that their freely chosen diet resembles that of non-alcoholic adult Americans.